Will we be allowed to win?

[johnpagenola]

To me the first few minutes of the Warriors game in the second round of the playoffs had two messages: You might have been allowed to play defense against the Blazers, but that won't be allowed against the Warriors. You will not be allowed to win (a game or so, OK, but not a series).

And during the regular season it's infuriating to see Paul George get a foul call when no Pelican is within 5 feet of him, the difference in foul calls when Holiday goes to the basket vs the foul calls Harden gets, etc., etc.

I can imagine LeBron telling AD, "Leave the Pelicans and you'll get the national TV games, exposure, and calls from the refs that you can't get in New Orleans. Also, you'll be allowed to win playoff games."

Perhaps the fact that we got a Christmas Day game indicates that the Zion phenomenon/hype/story is so strong that we will be allowed to win. In the past all of the traditional calls and no-calls just screwed over a small market team, but now they would be screwing over Zion. The NBA likes to hype their stars and the calls/no-calls against the Zion-Pelicans might get more scrutiny. A man can dream!

[Pels4Life]

bit of a stretch my friend but I can see where you going with stars get more rope with the refs.... maybe he will. Maybe not.

[Pelicanidae]

We got a Christmas Day game, and we also got a home game against the defending champs on opening night.

I think it's safe to say that, at least in some ways, the Zion Pelicans aren't being shafted like the AD Pelicans were in terms of scheduling. Perception has changed somewhat.

Obviously we can't tell about reffing until the actual games start and we can make a judgement. I'm going to be neutral and say they'll be fair (which I know is a stretch), but I don't think it's fair to condemn the refs over it yet. Call back in December and we'll talk

[Mount Zion]

While I agree that stars seem to be given a certain latitude, I generally feel that the refs try to call games fairly. I don’t subscribe to the conspiracy theories about not being allowed to win either. If I truly believed that the league conspired to fix games or eliminate some teams from being able to compete, I would just stop watching.

[johnpagenola]

I sent the following to a guy I know who works for the NBA:

Free Throws Game 1 Game 2 Game 3
Pelicans 11 9 12
Warriors 32 27 26

His response:

Yeah. No one questions the bias.

[Pelicanidae]

I sent the following to a guy I know who works for the NBA:

Free Throws Game 1 Game 2 Game 3
Pelicans 11 9 12
Warriors 32 27 26

His response:

Yeah. No one questions the bias.

Nobody CAN question the bias.

It was obvious upon first watch, to everyone. I know people (not on this site) who aren't even really Pelicans fans who brought it up to me. They were fans of other teams just watching the playoffs and they were noticing it.

I've said, pretty religiously, since that series happened that if it was called fairly in terms of free throws, it would have easily been a 6 game run. We lost game 2 by 5 points, and as you pointed out, they shot 16 more free throws than us. If we had even got 17 FTs (meaning they still would have shot 10 more than us!) we could have easily won that game. Then it goes back to New Orleans tied 1-1, and we win game 3. That has us up 2-1 at home, and anything could happen.

Even thinking about it still makes me mad.